


change my state with kings

by Anonymous



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, F/M, Fairy Tale Style, Hurt/Comfort, POV Rhaenys Targaryen, Rhaenys Targaryen Lives, Trauma, War of the Five Kings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-24
Updated: 2020-12-24
Packaged: 2021-03-11 02:01:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,326
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28277280
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: When Robert Baratheon claimed the throne, Rhaenys Targaryen still lived. Sometimes, the bravest thing a person can do is continue to do just that.The War of the Five Kings from the perspective of a Rhaenys that grew up as a hostage.
Relationships: Robb Stark/Rhaenys Targaryen (Daughter of Elia)
Comments: 32
Kudos: 87
Collections: Anonymous





	change my state with kings

_“The time for waiting has passed, brother,” said the Red Viper to the Sun. “Now it is time to act.”_

_“You must travel north and treat with the King in the North,” the Sun said to the Frog. “Now is the time for allies.”_

_“We would join our forces with yours,” said the Frog to the Young Wolf. “We want our princess back.”_

She lived only by the grace of the king, she’d been told, over and over again until it echoed in her mind, a refrain she knew as well as her own name. But when the king died, she still lived, because no one had time for her anymore. Not enough to bother throwing her in the dungeons or taking her head.

They took Lord Stark’s – the Hand, the same Lord Stark that had pulled her from underneath her father’s bed, all those years ago, or so she’d been told. They beheaded him, and then the whole realm was marching. The younger Stark girl vanished, and the older one became a prisoner, just like Rhaenys.

It hadn’t been so bad, really, most of the time. To most people, Rhaenys was more like a chair or a wall hanging than anyone of consequence, unworthy of attention more than perhaps an appraising look or a joke that wasn’t a joke to Robert about wedding her and taking her off his hands. But now Robert was dead, and the Dornish were marching, and Rhaenys’s captors were more aware of her and her dead Dornish mother than they’d been in years.

What was the point? She was not Sansa Stark, a lord’s daughter and sister. No, she was the daughter of a dead prince and the granddaughter of a deposed king and only the niece of the only relative she had that even _could_ do anything.

Too Dornish and not Dornish enough. Too Targaryen and not Targaryen enough.

Sansa lived for Winterfell. What did Rhaenys live for?

 _King Robert is a forgiving man at heart,_ she’d once heard Barristan Selmy say, and all she’d been able to think was, _is he?_

Every last Targaryen was dead, save for her, the living shade, and the king had neither let her live nor die.

He had once mused about marrying her off to his youngest brother and shipping them off to Dragonstone where he’d not have to look at her again. He hadn’t done it, though. Instead, he’d stripped her of her seat and kept her here, where he hadn’t wanted her and where she’d have given anything to escape. Now he was dead, just like all her family, and she was still trapped in this cursed place.

The Red Keep was haunted, and no one noticed but her.

* * *

Myrcella was sent to Highgarden, and the queen’s lips tightened into a thin line and she cast a look at Rhaenys as if it were somehow her fault. But then, she’d always done that, and Rhaenys had long since learned how she ought to react.

_Queen Cersei stroked her dark hair and smiled._

_“So much like Elia you look,” she said, and the smile took on a cruel edge. “So_ Dornish. _Do you know what some lord suggested be done to Princess Deria when she brought a dragon skull to this place?”_

_Rhaenys did. Everyone always made sure she knew all the worst, bloodiest stories in history. But she shook her head like she knew the queen wanted and kept quiet._

_“Send her to the meanest brothel to service any man that would have her.” Cersei’s hands clawed into her. “No need to go to a brothel for that. There are men enough here that like whores. What do you think, sweetling?”_

_Rhaenys didn’t say anything, and eventually, the queen scoffed and released her._

Don’t respond, she’d known for longer than she could remember. The only answer was what whoever was talking to her wanted to hear.

 _Meek and mild and obedient,_ she told herself now, _meek and mild and obedient._

But why _bother_?

Sansa had a family. She knew a life outside of this place and its haunted halls. She had something to fight for. All Rhaenys had was the face of a dead woman and the echoes of a dead man’s voice raised in song ringing in her ears. She’d never even had _friends._ The queen had had her handmaids changed every moon just to ensure she could never befriend them. None of the handful of lady companions Cersei had sent her over the years had lasted long, either. Spies though they’d been, it had still felt like a loss when they departed. Sometimes she wondered if the queen had not invited them just to see Rhaenys’s face fall when she was alone once more.

The Lady Brienne had been her favourite. She was of an age with Rhaenys, a Stormlands girl from an island to which Rhaenys had never been. Perhaps that meant Rhaenys should have been warier. But the girl’s pale hair had almost reminded her of times long gone, and she was from an island, and she’d at least pretended to like the same stories, and people had sneered at her, too. So once – just once – Rhaenys had murmured to her about how she, too, had been born on an island, one that she couldn’t remember; how her favourite stories had been of Alyssa Arryn and Serwyn of Mirror Shield, haunted both and unable to ever know rest; how for years she’d dreamed of dragons and a world whited out by torrents of snow.

Maybe that had been why she’d pocketed the coin.

It was stupid, she knew it then and she knew it every day since. But King’s Landing had long been stripped of any traces of the Targaryen sigil – _Rhaenys’s_ sigil. Brienne had liked the stories, and perhaps Rhaenys had longed for just a spark of the reckless bravery of Galladon of Morne or Symeon Star-Eyes. So when she had come across a coin that must have been there for years, one side stamped with a three-headed dragon and the other with the face of an old king – _Daeron,_ according to the inscription, though he was not one of the kings she’d been taught – she’d…well, she’d kept it.

To have it was treason, no doubt. But it was hers, and she could never bring herself to set it aside. She’d saved many coins she’d found over the years, bronze stars and silver stags and golden dragons, hidden them in pockets and the stitching of gowns. None had a dragon’s face.

But it had been years since she’d pocketed the coin, and nothing had changed, not for her. Rhaenys was older now than Lysa Arryn had been when she’d first come to court – _and wrapped her up in warm, safe arms? And kissed her head? And told her nobody would hurt her?_ No, that couldn’t be right – and she was still here, still imprisoned. Now Sansa – _Sansa who looked just like Lady Lysa had once looked –_ was here, too, and while she visited the sept and the godswood and prayed, prayed, prayed, Rhaenys could only watch her go.

Rhaenys’s mother was long dead and the Mother surely cared nothing for women without mothers who would never be mothers. Rhaenys’s _father_ was long dead and the Father had surely judged her lacking long ago, because nothing she’d call justice had ever come her way. Whenever she’d asked the Warrior for courage or the Crone for guidance, wisdom, she’d been met with naught but silence. The Smith had no strength to give her, and the Maiden had never protected her from anything. No, the Stranger was Rhaenys’s god, and had been since she could walk. She’d danced with him her whole life and sang to him sometimes even though no one else did and perhaps he’d loved her enough to not take her then. Perhaps he loved her enough to not take her now.

The sept was no place for death’s handmaidens, and it was no place for her.

She retreated to the library, as she always had. At least there, no one would speak to her.

* * *

Joffrey married Margaery and choked to death at the feast; the queen blamed her brother and Sansa Stark vanished; chaos reigned and they threw Rhaenys in the cells just like the Imp.

They didn’t believe she’d done anything, she thought once she’d stopped trembling from fear and started trembling from cold, otherwise she’d have already lost her head. But she’d grown up as a hostage with treatment befitting her rank, and now she was in a cell, locked away from everyone and everything. What was she supposed to _do_?

This gown, like all her gowns, had a few coins she’d squirreled away over the years hidden away inside, sewn into the hem, the sleeves. She could tear them out, bribe a guard…but then what? When she’d hidden those coins, it had been with the hope that there’d be an opportunity to run. Now, she’d be caught in minutes. So she stayed there, alone, in silence, day after day, until a familiar small face appeared before her.

“This is Ser Pounce,” Tommen said, on his knees before her on the other side of the bars, holding up a little kitten for her inspection. “Queen Margaery got me three kittens. I thought you might be lonely down here.”

So Tommen had married his brother’s widow. Rhaenys should tell him to go. But the boy king was the only company she’d had in so long, and when she tried to tell him what she knew she should, the word stuck in her throat.

Balerion had clawed Joffrey once, and Queen Cersei had taken it out on Rhaenys when no one had been able to catch the cat. Rhaenys would be punished for this, too, but she couldn’t send Tommen away, couldn’t be alone in the dark for another moment.

She pushed her slender hand through the bars. Tommen latched onto it, squeezing tight. He’d soon reach the age where this would embarrass him, she supposed, and then he’d be as distant as everyone else in this godsforsaken castle. But for now, she’d cherish every touch anyone was willing to give her. The Red Keep was haunted, but she wasn’t alone.

How long had it been since someone had touched her like this? To comfort, rather than hurt; to let her know she wasn’t alone. Her companions had shared her bed, but she’d never slept well beside them. None of them had ever stayed long enough for her to grow comfortable with their presence. She hadn’t known them, and they’d been gone before she ever could.

But she was awake now, and Tommen was a sweet thing. He’d brought her a kitten now, and years ago, he’d had a fawn. He’d cried when Joffrey had butchered it. Rhaenys had thought of Elia and Aegon and bloody corpses wrapped in red silk and let Tommen cling to her hand.

His hand was slightly clammy, but now they were clinging to each other as if they were all that were left in the world.

It was too much and not enough all at once. She wanted to yank her hand free and scrub off the top layer of skin under scalding water. She wanted someone to gather her in and hold her close, stroking her hair and murmuring promises that it would all be over soon into her ear. She wanted to go _home,_ but she didn’t have a home.

She didn’t want to fight anymore. She didn’t want to die.

Rhaenys clapped her free hand over her mouth and sobbed. Tommen’s eyes welled up, too. The torch gave off just enough light that she could see them. Such pretty eyes they were, large and bright and green-green- _green,_ the colour of wildfire. His mother’s eyes, his uncle’s. His brother’s. Joffrey had died at three and ten, and he’d looked so much like Ser Jaime all those years ago. Ser Jaime had been kind to her once, hadn’t he? Had she just imagined it, toddling after him when she’d first begun to walk? Were her memories of him wrapping her in his snowy cloak and carrying her to bed just a child’s flight of fancy? All those happy thoughts that she clung to when she was scared, just sweet lies?

She’d loved him once. That much she knew. That much had to be truth.

Tommen didn’t have his brother, mother, uncle’s sharply defined cheekbones and strong jaw. He was rounder and softer and sweeter. That he’d come to see her demonstrated more boldness than he ever had before. And here he was.

She dragged in a greedy breath, fingers tightening around Tommen’s briefly.

“Please,” she choked. “Talk to me?”

He blinked back his tears as he thought hard on how to do as she’d asked, and the pale warmth of affection flooded through her. Tommen would hate her, too, one day, and it would only be so long before that day came. No doubt he’d even grow to closer resemble his family, all awful beauty and cutting cruelty. But now, he was a gentle lad, kind and good and sweet. She of all people could hardly fault him for being born of incest.

“My uncle escaped,” Tommen confided. “Lord Varys let him out. He killed Grandfather.”

She’d looked forward to the death of Tywin Lannister for as long as she’d understood who he was and what he’d done. Now the surge of satisfaction was quiet and subdued, a tiny flicker of warmth in the cold.

_He killed my mother._

Perhaps she ought to give Tommen her condolences. But that was one thing she could not do.

She repeated, “I see.”

“I don’t think Varys did it alone,” Tommen said, lowering his voice and leaning in. He tilted his head to the side and pursed his mouth, and though the expression would have looked thoughtful on anyone else, Tommen’s round face made it look so serious it was comical. It was all Rhaenys could do to not laugh, but if she laughed, she might start crying, and if she started crying, she might never stop. “Someone must have helped him.”

“Who do you think did that?”

She didn’t know. She didn’t care. Joffrey, Tywin – they deserved to die, and whoever had done it had done the world a favour. What did it matter to her what happened after that? But if she kept up the conversation, maybe Tommen would stay longer, and she wouldn’t be alone in the dark.

“I don’t know,” Tommen said. “But…there’s no reason Varys would, unless someone convinced him.”

Tyrion Lannister, the Imp, the little monkey demon that might have killed the king – hated by his father, hated by his sister, hated by the realm entire, but hated less than Rhaenys.

She’d never _done_ anything.

Someone had helped Tyrion, and helped Sansa, and no one had ever lifted a finger for Rhaenys. What must it be like, to be so loved?

“Hmm,” she managed. “You may be right.”

She drew her knees up to her chest and wrapped her arm around them, hugging herself with one arm, still clinging with her other hand to Tommen’s.

“It won’t be so long until I rule,” Tommen said. “I’m king, I’ll make them let you out.”

He scowled and added fiercely, “I won’t let them hurt you.”

A bold promise for a boy of ten to make.

Joffrey had only been twelve when he’d ordered a man beheaded. Two years was not so long, not really. She’d grown to womanhood in this pit of vipers. Surely, she could last so long.

But Tommen was gentler than Joffrey had ever been, and _them_ meant his mother, meant his father-uncle, meant his wife. Meant everyone and everything he knew. Tommen meant well. But he couldn’t know what he was saying, couldn’t understand the weight of his promise.

Rhaenys’s own family had never chosen her over anyone. How could she ever expect someone else to do just that?

“Tommen,” she said, and pulled her hand back into the cell to retrieve one of her coins. She didn’t need to tear open the hem of her dress for this coin – no, this one was easily accessible in a pocket sewn into her sleeve. She pressed it into the boy king’s palm and closed his fingers around it, holding onto his warm fist with both hands for a moment after.

Daeron the Good, she’d learned sometime in the years between finding the coin and being thrown into a cell. The king that had married a Dornish princess and brought her people peacefully into the realm. He had gentle eyes, this long dead king. Sometimes, looking at the carving felt like having a friend.

The Good, though. Not Mad nor Cruel nor Monstrous nor Unworthy. Not all Targaryens were loathed. Not everywhere.

“Hold onto this for me,” she murmured. “And if…you ever happen to meet someone from Dorne, or – or House Rowan – or even Tully –”

She quite liked Mathis Rowan despite herself – he spoke to her like a person and never looked past her like she wasn’t there and occasionally even made a point of mentioning Elia as if he could tell how hungry for someone to tell her something, _anything_. She’d never met Lord Tully, but she’d heard tell he was kind. His father had fought against hers, but they had the same enemies today. He might…

_“I can take you away from here,” Lady Arryn had said once, so many years ago, before time and loss had etched harsh lines into her face and her big warm eyes had gone suspicious and hard. “You could marry my brother and be lady of Riverrun one day, would you like that?”_

Naïve, she knew now, but then…she wouldn’t have minded. She wouldn’t have minded at all.

“Will you do this for me, sweetling?”

 _Be my knight._ But that wasn’t right, she supposed. She didn’t need a knight, or a stag, or a lion. She needed a raven. And it seemed like Tommen would be just that because he set his jaw and nodded.

“Yes,” he said, and patted her hand. “I promise.”

* * *

Time passed. Tommen did not come back again. Time passed.

She tried to count the days at first, but they were a haze, wake and sleep blurring together. Sometimes she could hear a sweet voice singing lowly, but when she opened her eyes, there was no one around at all.

 _Mama,_ she thought, and closed her eyes again.

When hands dragged her out from the cells under the keep, she didn’t fight. She didn’t resist. She just stumbled along as best she could in the direction they tugged her, dizzy with hunger and weak with thirst. They were saying something, but the words didn’t make sense. If they wanted an answer, she couldn’t give it.

When they released her at last, her knees buckled underneath her, and she fell to the floor of the throne room with a stifled cry of pain. Her knees and wrist throbbed from the impact. Gasping for air, she dragged her gaze up from the ground and at the person whose feet she’d been dropped.

He was barely a man. Younger than her, surely, but the reddish beard covering half his face made it hard to tell. She shrank away from him. He didn’t try to touch her. Instead, he knelt beside her so he could look her in the eye, where she could see his face clearly.

 _Oh,_ she thought. She knew that auburn hair, those blue eyes. She’d grown up seeing them around the Red Keep – Lady Arryn’s hair, Lady Arryn’s eyes. Sansa’s, too. This could only be one person.

“Princess Rhaenys,” he murmured. “I’m –”

“King in the North,” she said. It came out as a rasp and she cringed when she registered that she’d cut him off but continued anyway – what did it even _matter_ any more? “Robb Stark.”

He nodded and surprised her with a smile. It was softer than she would have imagined. “That’s right. Do you need a maester, my lady?”

She shook her head. Robb Stark looked unimpressed. He nodded at her wrist. “Let me see.”

She started and pulled it close to her chest, wrapping her other hand around it protectively. Robb frowned. He extended his own hand, pausing before touching her until she’d relaxed.

“I won’t hurt you,” he said, and when he took her wrist to examine it, it was with a firm, careful grip. It didn’t hurt. “Hmm.”

Voice still hoarse, she asked, “What have you done with Tommen and Myrcella?”

“They’re safe,” he assured her immediately, stroking the back of her hand with a thumb. “But it wasn’t me. From what I understand, when they were brought before Lord Rowan, they presented him with a Targaryen coin they claimed was from you. He passed it and them along to Princess Arianne, who had a trusted knight escort them to Dorne. They’ll be happy there, she says. From what her brother has told me of their homeland, I imagine she’s right.”

Warm relief spread all the way through to her toes. She closed her eyes for a moment to bask in it before she, much more hesitantly, asked, “And what are you going to do with me?”

“Your family sent spears to my cause,” Robb explained – softly, so softly, as if she were a bird that might flitter away in fear, as if she might shatter if he spoke too loudly, and truthfully, she could not say she wouldn’t.

She was a _dragon._ Fire and blood. Unbowed, unbent, unbroken. But here she was, weak as a kitten, unable to even stand. Unbowed, at least, was still true. Robb Stark, kneeling beside her, was right at eye level, and Rhaenys did not lower her gaze.

 _Your family,_ he told her, and still, even now, her traitorous heart skipped a beat and she thought, _Father. Grandmother. Viserys._

Of course that wasn’t what he meant.

Not the family that shared her name, not the family she knew. Just the Martells that, if she’d ever met, she couldn’t remember.

It was a hurt she hadn’t even known she could feel, and Robb was still _talking_. “You’re safe now, princess. We’re allies. You are not my prisoner. I’m not going to hurt you.”

He released her wrist at last. “Lady Brienne. Lady Obara.”

He was looking past her shoulder, so Rhaenys turned her head to follow his gaze to the entrance. The women seemed larger than life as they came marching down towards her. One of them bowed to the king. The other did not. It was she, the shorter of the two, that stepped forward first and knelt beside Rhaenys as the king rose.

“My name is Obara Sand, cousin,” she said, steading Rhaenys as she tried to stand and helping her get to her feet. “The eldest daughter of Prince Oberyn of Dorne.”

Rhaenys couldn’t speak. Obara didn’t seem to mind.

“My father should know that you’ve been found,” the Dornishwoman continued. “He is with my sisters and our cousin. They shall be here soon.”

“I…”

What did you say to a cousin you’d never met? Rhaenys didn’t know, and she only had seconds to wonder before the taller woman turned to face them and Rhaenys completely forgot what it was that she’d been unsure of. The woman had pale hair and blue eyes, and Rhaenys _knew_ her, even though she’d grown even taller and broader and her nose had been broken at least once and she was clad in armour instead of the drab dresses she’d worn then.

“Brienne,” Rhaenys said. “I haven’t…it’s been a long time.”

“Princess Rhaenys,” Brienne answered, head lowered in deference.

King Robb looked at Rhaenys, then Brienne, then back to Rhaenys. “I’ll leave you to it, then. I’ll let Princess Arianne know where to find you.”

He left, and Rhaenys kept staring at Brienne. Brienne was from the Stormlands. So why was she here, with a Northman and a Dornishwoman? She’d knelt before Robb Stark…Rhaenys asked, “How did you come to serve the King in the North?”

Brienne’s eyes widened.

“I don’t,” she said. “I serve Lady Catelyn.”

She explained, briefly, how she’d sworn herself to the Lady of Winterfell after Renly Baratheon’s death. How she’d escorted the Kingslayer back to King’s Landing on her liege lady’s behest, arriving after Joffrey’s death. How she’d left in pursuit of Sansa. “Ser Jaime swore a vow to return her daughters.”

An awful noise clawed out of Rhaenys’s throat – hoarse and rasping and borderline hysterical, the screech of an ancient sword pulled out of an unoiled sheath or the Iron Throne itself, the nails of the old king Aerys dragging against stone. A laugh, she realized, and Brienne flinched.

“A vow,” Rhaenys echoed. “He swore a vow to my grandsire, too. He was supposed to protect _me._ ”

He was supposed to protect her, and he’d cut her grandfather’s throat. He was supposed to protect her, yet he’d let her be shoved in front of the usurper king, still barefoot and in her bed gown, afraid and in tears. He was supposed to protect her, but he’d never uttered a word in her defence when she’d been threatened with death and he’d been gone when she’d been thrown into a cell.

The younger of his nephew-sons was a truer knight than he had ever been.

“When did you grow acquainted with _Ser Jaime_?” Rhaenys asked. “Were you spying for the queen when you slept in my bed?”

She had genuinely believed Brienne had been on her side, she realized. Her lady companions had all been spies, but Rhaenys had really believed that Brienne cared for her all those years ago.

How stupid could a girl be?

But Brienne exclaimed, “No!” and her eyes were big and blue and hurt. They were painful to look at. Rhaenys pointedly fixed her own eyes on a spot just past her erstwhile friend’s shoulder and tried not to shudder.

“Ser Jaime…” Brienne began, and a hundred bitter, angry completions flashed through Rhaenys’s mind. _Ser Jaime…_ had gotten his own sister with child thrice over and named his adulterous, incestuous get king. Had blown a kiss to that sister, disguised in the commons, flaunting his treasonous affair for the whole world to see. Had started a brawl in the streets and joined his father in his pointless assault on the Riverlands. Had been a traitor and an oathbreaker for nearly her entire life. And if he’d truly sworn a vow to Lady Stark…if he’d truly sent Brienne off to find and retrieve Sansa and Arya…that meant that Rhaenys’s old friend had searched high and low for Lady Catelyn’s daughters at the behest of the man that had once sworn to keep Rhaenys safe, when neither that friend nor the man had ever cared enough to help Rhaenys.

What was so special about the Starks, anyway?

“He’s changed,” Brienne finished, and Rhaenys could only scoff.

_Not for the better._

Silence fell for a heartbeat. Obara placed a hand on Rhaenys’s shoulder.

“Come,” she said. “Arianne is anxious to meet you.”

* * *

Neither Arianne nor Obara looked much like Rhaenys, it seemed to her. She hadn’t been expecting that. In her fuzzy memories, truth or dream or something in between, of her father and brother and grandmother and uncle, all of them had hair pale as starlight and eyes starkly purple against ghostly skin. With her dark hair, skin, eyes, Rhaenys had stood out, the only one living amongst the ghosts, the only human amongst the unearthly heirs to dragons.

Had she been aware of the difference, back then?

Her few precious memories of her mother, just as fragile and distant as everything from before, were of dark hair and warm skin and sweet perfume and features that time had blurred together until Rhaenys couldn’t distinguish a single one. The hair, at least, had been just like Rhaenys’s. She’d always assumed it, just like her skin, was a Martell trait. But even though Arianne’s colouring was close, she was short and voluptuous where Rhaenys was tall and slender, her hair in ringlets where Rhaenys’s fell straighter. Obara was tall like Rhaenys, but her hair was lighter, body broader. It shouldn’t have been surprising, but surprised she was.

Rhaenys didn’t know what to say to either of them. Obara seemed just as unsure, but Arianne didn’t seem to have that problem. She poured Rhaenys wine and spoke as if they were the closest of friends.

“I have something for you,” she said, and held up a familiar coin for Rhaenys’s inspection. “Tommen said you told him to give it to me. That was clever. I –”

“Don’t let anyone hurt them,” Rhaenys interrupted. “Tommen and Myrcella. Don’t…”

Tiny Arianne had eyes like steel. She covered Rhaenys’s hand with both of her own, small and strong, and pressed the coin into her palm.

“Don’t worry,” the heir to Dorne said. “I won’t.”

Rhaenys’s shoulders slumped. “That’s…that’s good.”

“For now,” Arianne continued, letting go of Rhaenys’s hand, “it’s more important to focus on _you._ ”

Rhaenys blinked. Arianne reached into her boot and pulled out a knife. She gestured to Obara, who withdrew a full coin purse from beneath her cloak. Arianne took it, then handed both it and the knife to Rhaenys.

“Just in case,” she said. Rhaenys stared down at the knife, wrapped her fingers around the hilt. It was an unfamiliar weight in her hand. She rather thought she liked it.

She looked back up at Arianne. The princess’s steel gaze had softened.

“I promise you,” she said. “We will never allow you to be imprisoned again.”

* * *

The next morning, King Robb came to her door with bread and fruit and wine, flanked by two men in Martell colours.

“Your Grace,” said one of the men. “Would you like us to send him away?”

She shook her head, and _oh,_ wasn’t it something when they both immediately relaxed as if her word was law?

“Thank you, no,” she said, and nodded to Robb. “Please, come in.”

She closed the door as he set down the tray.

“Compliments of Princess Arianne,” he said, gesturing at the food. “She asked me to send her regrets that she couldn’t meet with you this morning.”

He stared pouring the wine. She asked, “What’s happening?”

“A great council,” he said, pushing a cup towards her. “To decide what shall happen to the realm. Likely they’ll want to hear from you, but for now, your cousin Nymeria is representing your interests.”

Her interests, as if anyone cared what she wanted. As if family members she’d only just met could know what she wanted. “Shouldn’t you be there?”

“I have no need to be. The North is independent now. My mother is representing me, but many of the topics for debate are no longer relevant to us.”

“Oh?”

“King Robert’s brothers are both dead,” Robb added. “You might be interested to know that some are championing your cause.”

She let out a plaintive sound before she could stop herself and bit down on her tongue until a coppery tang filled her mouth.

 _I never want to see this place again,_ she thought.

The Baratheon claim to the throne had been derived from the Princess Rhaelle. It had been won by conquest but claimed by law. So, if the Baratheons were dead…the law sided with her. The first and last child of the first son of the last Targaryen king.

Sided with her, but against her, because _she didn’t want the damned thing._

What would happen, next rebellion? Would that be when someone finally cut her throat, to drag her off the throne she’d never asked for in the first place? She was _so sick_ of people using her.

“Dragonstone is mine by right,” she said, voice atremble, even though she didn’t even know if she wanted that, either. “Whether they name me queen or not. I am the last Targaryen.”

She’d suffered for her name, but her name gave her a claim to her ancestral home. She didn’t remember it enough to miss it. But it was hers, or it should be. Nothing had ever been hers.

Robb nodded. “From what I’ve gathered, Princess Arianne has made just that claim. The Dornish lords and those of Crackclaw Point agreed. Lord Tully, Lord Rowan, Lord Blackwood. Many more, too. You shall have it. That much, I think is certain.”

It was an effort to not sigh her relief.

A place where she could go; a place where she could escape the schemers and the spies. Somewhere she could make _safe._

She picked up the cup Robb had filled for her and drank deeply, washing away the taste of blood, before sinking into her chair. Robb took that as an invitation to sit across from her, hand her a plate piled high with food, and begin eating himself.

Poison would not be so bad a way to go, Rhaenys suspected as she picked at her meal. If only she could muster up enough energy to actually eat it. But perhaps Robb Stark mistook her lack of appetite for apprehension, because he offered her morsels from his own plate as if she were his bride. _Or a child._ It rankled, but she couldn’t muster the energy to object.

“How are you feeling?” he asked once she’d finally pleaded off more food. “Is your wrist any better?”

“Fine, my lord,” she said. “Thank you.”

“I once hurt my wrist sparring with my brother,” he said, and started talking about what he’d learned about treating injuries since. Baffled, Rhaenys listened. He kept talking, and when he offered her more wine, she didn’t even think to refuse.

* * *

Arianne handed her a sealed letter.

“From Tommen and Myrcella,” she said quietly. “I thought you’d like to know they’re safe.”

Rhaenys broke the seal and scanned it quickly. It was Myrcella’s handwriting, that much she could be sure, and it indeed contained assurances that they had not been harmed. She exhaled deeply. One fewer thing to fear.

“The Water Gardens…” she said, and trailed off, the question unspoken. Arianne smiled.

“They were built as a gift by Maron to Daenerys upon their wedding. They stand not far away from Sunspear. I hope I’ll have the chance to show you one day soon.”

Arianne kept talking as they walked, introducing her to Obara’s sisters, explaining the progress being made in negotiations, discussing the state of the Martell Stark alliance. Rhaenys listened intently as her cousin spoke – _Obara, Nymeria, and Tyene, here; Sarella in Oldtown; Elia, Obella, Dorea, and Loreza in Dorne; redrawing the border between the Westerlands and the Riverlands; a preliminary draft of a trade agreement…_ Arianne made it all seem so simple. Rhaenys liked it.

“Robb Stark came to see me,” she said carefully when Arianne paused. “He said you sent him.”

Arianne nodded, eyes gleaming. “Yes. He wanted to meet you. I had intended to have one of my ladies bring you news and a meal, but he asked if he might do it instead. It seems you made quite the impression on him.”

Rhaenys fiddled with the end of her sleeve and couldn’t think of a response. Smile fading, Arianne stepped closer, close enough to touch.

“My brother Quentyn assures me he is a good man,” she said, voice dropping to barely above a whisper. “But if you’re uncertain, our cousin Tyene would be more than happy to accompany you. I can assure you; no harm will come to you with her by your side.”

“No,” Rhaenys said, thinking of Tyene’s sharp, sharp eyes and eerie smiles. Strangers the lot of them. She was so tired of being wary. “Don’t worry. I’ll be fine.”

Arianne didn’t press the issue.

“I hope you don’t mind the guards,” she said instead. “I promise, they’re good men. Trustworthy men. Loyal to me and my house. To Dorne.”

 _And to you,_ she didn’t say, but her dark eyes were so filled with concern, she might as well have. Even though Rhaenys didn’t think that her cousin looked much like her mother, the words, those eyes, brought to mind perfume and warm hugs. The urge to throw herself into Arianne’s arms and be held was almost overwhelming.

Rhaenys’s mother had been a Dornish princess. She’d never considered that Dornish loyalty would extend to her.

“Thank you,” she said quietly. Her voice was hoarse, so she cleared her throat and said it again: “Thank you.”

Arianne nodded. “Of course.”

* * *

It was strange to be free to go where she pleased, and when Rhaenys took meals in the great hall, beside a different person each time, it quickly became apparent where she pleased didn’t include there.

 _Allies,_ she told herself whenever she wanted to flee. _They will never cage you again._

So she forced herself to stay, sitting beside lords and ladies and knights alike. She joined Ladies Whent, Waynwood, and Mertyns for tea and walks through the grounds; she drank wine and listened to Ser Baelor, heir to the Hightower, as he told her about when he’d met her mother, to Lords Velaryon and Celtigar as they spoke of House Targaryen, to Lord Tully as he told her about his kingly nephew. She smiled and laughed and prodded them all for information and opinions, knowing she needed them to like her and trying everything in her power to make sure they did. But evening after evening, she still spent with Robb.

They talked about nothing and everything, and the idle chatter – about summer and winter and beloved pets – slowly gave way to more. Whispered secrets and candlelit confessions, they were not, but it didn’t matter. Robb Stark was a king, not a spy; was close enough to her age, not nearly a decade younger. Never before had she had someone to talk to quite like this.

He made her laugh, and he made her smile, and she found herself telling him about the Red Keep, the only home she could remember. In turn, Robb told her about Winterfell and his siblings.

“I didn’t trade Jaime Lannister for my sisters,” he said. “What kind of brother am I?”

“I can’t answer that,” said Rhaenys. “It’s been a long time since I had a brother.”

Would Aegon have traded someone for her? Would he have waged a war to get back to her and make sure she was safe? If only she had the answer. What she did have an answer to…

“They’ll understand,” she said. “If I could see Aegon again…I think I’d forgive him for almost anything.”

“Almost anything,” Robb repeated. “What sort of thing wouldn’t you forgive?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” she said, surprised to hear the teasing note in her own voice. “Maybe waging an entire war only to avoid dealing with any of the negotiations in the aftermath?”

Robb’s eyes crinkled. It made her very aware of how close they were – close enough that she could count the eyelashes framing those eyes; close enough that she could feel the heat of his hand beside hers.

He kissed her and she flinched away from him before she could stop herself, eyes widening in horror once she realized what she’d done.

“I’m sorry –” she choked – _no, no, I’m sorry, I’ll do whatever you want, please don’t hurt me._

He didn’t hurt her. Nor did he kiss her again.

“I’m sorry,” he echoed instead. He brought his hand up – slowly, so slowly – to her cheek, ran his thumb softly along the line of her jaw. She didn’t breathe. “I won’t hurt you, princess.”

Was it stupid, that she wanted to believe him, or just pathetic? His touch – so, so gentle – made tears well in her eyes. They didn’t fall. Robb stroked her jaw again.

“Marry me, princess,” he said. “I’d be good to you. I swear it.”

The words were simple, but they didn’t make sense, not at first. The old rebels had had no use for spirited little girls; the new had none for broken women grown. What could the King in the North want with a southron maiden, older than him, that had ruthlessly crushed any wit or humour she’d ever possessed? But the answer was obvious in the way he kept addressing her: _princess._

She was a Targaryen still, the blood of kings and dragonlords. Any man that wed her could have a grasp onto power through her womb – a claim to the kingdom he claimed not to want, a claim to the Iron Throne with her body and her blood.

 _I want to go home,_ she thought piteously, but she didn’t have a home. She was the last, lonely remnant of a dynasty.

The last Targaryen. The last dragon.

“Rhaegar was the last dragon,” Queen Cersei had said to her once, green eyes narrowed into sneering slits. “You’re nothing.”

 _Like you were to him?_ Rhaenys thought now, and had thought then, and always knew better than to say. But the queen hadn’t been wrong. What did she matter, to anyone? Nothing. Just the Valyrian blood that ran through her veins.

She wasn’t a queen. She _wasn’t._

A moon ago, she wouldn’t have resisted. What would have been the point? But now the realm had been cleaved apart into factions upon warring factions and all the vultures would be carving out their bit of flesh. If Robb Stark was the victor, he’d get what he wanted no matter what she said. She couldn’t let that happen.

There had once been talk of making her a good marriage, a loyalist marriage. She was highborn, after all, royal on both sides. Precedent dictated that she be wed to the new king’s heir. But King Robert hated dragonspawn, and Prince Joffrey was several years younger than her besides. Renly was not so far from her age, and as they’d grown older, he’d eyed her with increasingly calculating blue eyes. Rhaenys had seen Jon Arryn glance from her to him and back again, near the end, speculating, but perhaps Robert just hadn’t wanted to hear of it by then, no matter that he’d blustered about it himself before.

Had he not wanted to think of her, he could have just sent her to Stannis. Instead, she’d stayed in limbo, year after year, growing older and ever surer that she’d never be free of this gilded cage. Eddard Stark being named Hand had been sparked a tiny, secret hope that that wouldn’t be true – before Robert had been gored by a boar, she’d almost expected this same match, if anything at all, even though half of her knew that she’d never be allowed to wed the future warden of the north, no matter how loyal the Starks were. Today was not tomorrow was not forever. Today’s friends could be tomorrow’s bitter enemies. But then, if sons were not their fathers, surely daughters could not be either, and there had never been any need for Rhaenys to be caged at all.

By all rights, she would have been named Lady of Dragonstone and sent to live a quiet life after publicly renouncing her claim to the throne. She’d have done it. She’d have done anything they’d said. She’d only been a child. But she was no longer.

Now…Robb Stark would have to drag her before the septon and make her say the words at swordpoint. If he wanted his son on the Iron Throne, he’d have to face what he was while taking her against her will, have to wrench her legs apart while she screamed and struggled and sobbed.

His kiss had been gentle, undemanding. Perhaps if she didn’t resist, he’d continue to treat her that way, like someone that cared to not cause her pain. But Rhaenys had held her tongue for year after year and she was _done_ being obedient. What had that ever gotten her anyway?

She’d been silent too long.

Her eyes finally welled over. A tear traced its way down each cheek, and Robb wiped one away with his thumb. His hand was so warm.

“I’ll take that as a no,” he said quietly. “Don’t cry, princess.”

She blinked hard. Robb pulled his hand away from her face and back into his lap. For the first time, he lowered his gaze, just for a moment. When he squared his shoulders and looked back at her, he said, “You need not be afraid of me.”

But she _did._ Robb Stark was gentle with her, all soft words and kind touch, but she wasn’t blind – she could see the barely leashed tension, the anger beneath the placid exterior. How long would it be before that came out?

She ought to reassure him. But all she could do was shift away from him and mumble something vague about not being afraid.

Robb kept coming to see her, every day, and he didn’t bring it up again.

She was out of the cells now, but time was still a fickle thing. She slept and she didn’t dream; she slept and she woke up in tears. She sleepwalked through days and dreamed so vividly some nights she might have been awake. The sun rose and set; moonlight shone. She knew not how long had passed nor what time of the year it was nor when all the lords that now roamed the halls had arrived. But Robb was there. Her refusal hadn’t angered him, and every day, he was there.

In the mornings, he came with wine and eggs; in the evenings, he came with a smile and a story. At first, she eyed him warily, convinced of a trap, but he wasn’t angry. He didn’t bring it up again, not the kiss; not his request; not her tears.

 _I’ll be good to you,_ he’d promised, and perhaps he’d meant it, because he kept coming to her, and he kept making her laugh. When she smiled at him, the faintest blush spread pink across his cheeks. She couldn’t look away.

“I used to be so angry,” he said one evening, when they’d retreated to her chambers after dining in the main hall, where she’d conversed with Lady Tarly and Lady Mooton. “I didn’t know what to do. All I could think was of how I wanted to kill Joffrey with my bare hands for what he did to my father. But now…Joffrey, Cersei – they’re dead, and I have my siblings back, and I’m still…I don’t know what to do when there’s no one left to be angry at.”

“You’re lucky, then,” Rhaenys said slowly. “I’d rather be angry than afraid.”

“Are you afraid, princess?”

The lantern bathed Robb's face in warm light. The door was unlocked – she could get up and leave. The guards on the other side were not there to stop her. The Red Keep was filled with Dornishmen that had gone to war for her, the daughter of their lost princess.

Still, Rhaenys thought, _Always._

Robb Stark looked very much like Sansa, but very little like Arya. It made Rhaenys think of silvery gold hair and purple eyes, and _oh,_ what wouldn’t she give to see Viserys again. What would he have looked like, as an adult? What would _Aegon_ have looked like? So often, she’d tried to imagine her little brother and seen little more than fat cheeks and tufts of pale hair. But he would have been taller than her, more like than not, a man grown trained in arms by now. Would he have looked like their father? Rhaegar had been handsome, Rhaenys had heard tell, and though his face was even harder to remember than Elia’s, she could picture that a vague idea of a man with fair skin and high cheekbones towering over her, tall as the sky.

She must have held Aegon, and Rhaegar must have held her.

Robb Stark’s father would never hold him again, but Robb could still hold his siblings. What wouldn’t Rhaenys give to be able to do that?

When she told him that, Robb laughed a little. “My father wasn’t much for hugging.”

She tilted her head to the side. “No?”

“Well,” Robb amended, “not me, at any rate. My mother did. Does. But my father was always more affectionate to my sisters.”

“I think my father hugged me,” Rhaenys confessed. She closed her eyes as she tried to remember anything at all beyond the aching lament of a harp and the Prince of Dragonstone’s voice raised in song ringing in her ears, now and always. He’d picked her up sometimes, she thought, and put her on his knee. And…

“Nyssa,” she breathed.

“Nyssa?”

Rhaenys nodded. “That’s what he called me. Nyssa. His little dragon. I think…he used to hold me and tell me stories. And sing.”

How could she say this, to a Stark, weaned on horror stories of a kidnapped maiden and murdered kin? How could she reminisce over the man responsible, no matter how warm the smile that man had always had for her? But Robb just watched her. “And your mother?”

“She…” Rhaenys swallowed and wound a lock of her hair tight around her finger. Her father’s song rang in her ears and her mother’s scent filled her nose and all she could do was grip at that silk-soft dark hair like a lifeline. “She couldn’t play as much. She was sick, then busy with Aegon, but she…I think she hugged me, too.”

Robb kept watching her, as if waiting for her to say more, but how could she explain what it was like to walk into a room and feel like someone ought to be there, to long for that someone she could barely remember at all? How could she explain the way those vague recollections might not have even been real – the loneliness that left a little girl unable to do anything but cling to elusive wisps of memories that might have been dreams, nightmares that might have been memories, all of it so close to slipping out of her grasp forever? How could she explain any of it at all?

She couldn’t.

The Red Keep was haunted. Perhaps it was by her.

* * *

They called her into the meeting room to deliver their verdict, and though she wasn’t on trial, when Arianne moved before her and dipped into a curtsy, it felt like a sentencing. “Congratulations, Your Grace.”

And she knew not what to say, not as Arianne swore her fealty nor as one by one, the lords bowed before her and pledged their allegiance. She must have said something, because no one looked at her strangely and no one hesitated before making their vow, but it wasn’t until the last lord had knelt and she was dismissing them that she was fully aware of what she was doing.

“Cousin,” she said as the lords filed out. “Stay for a moment.”

Arianne did as she was bid. She frowned a little, tilting her head. “Are you all right, Rhaenys?”

“Will you stay?” Rhaenys asked. “Arianne. Be my Hand.”

A Queen Regnant and a woman as Hand – there would be an uproar, but Rhaenys didn’t care. There was nothing any of them could do to hurt her anymore. The Baratheons were dead and she was the last Targaryen. House Martell had more Targaryen blood than any other living house. Arianne would be her Hand and her heir and one day, it would be the Martells of her line that sat the throne.

Good. She should have it.

No child would grow in Rhaenys’s womb. The Targaryen line would end with her – the Targaryen line had ended a long time ago and now it would be final.

Arianne was the heir to Dorne. She had brought Tommen and Mycella to safety and assigned Rhaenys protection and offered her a knife so she could protect herself. She’d fought for Rhaenys to have Dragonstone, and no doubt was responsible for winning her the throne.

No one would be a better Hand. No one would be a better queen.

Arianne Martell had a way of making a person feel like the most important person in the world. Her smile could light up a room and make everything else vanish. She did not smile now. Instead, she inclined her head. “It would be my honour, Your Grace.”

* * *

Robb found her during the feast. She supposed it hadn’t been hard. She’d stayed long enough to make herself seen at the head of the high table, Arianne holding the place of honour at her right hand, and somehow found the words she’d needed – introduced herself to all these people that already knew her, announced her choice of Hand, ignored the grumbles and took heart in the cheers. She’d drunk wine and eaten lamb and reassured Lord Rowan that she was thankful for his help. Then she’d left Arianne to preside over the feast and charm the lords while she slipped out of the hall.

It was easier to breathe, outside of the hall. Rhaenys sat down on the floor with her back against the wall and closed her eyes. From out here, the rumble of voices seemed almost comforting. The press of the knife Arianne had given her against her forearm, within reach and concealed by her loose sleeves, was even more so. She’d only been there for a few minutes when Robb appeared. “May I join you?”

She gestured wordlessly. He sat down on the floor, right beside her, just as near as he’d been days – weeks? – ago. She stared at his hand, so close to hers. If she closed that short distance, would he intertwine their fingers? That hand had caressed her cheek…

She’d been kissed a time or two before. Ever since her childhood, the bravest of squires would come try to flirt with her. As she’d grown up, the clumsy compliments had turned to more practiced teasing and flattery, laced with innuendo, and the squires had turned into knights. Never had she not known people that wanted to steal a kiss. Some of the highborn ones might have even harboured hopes of her hand, futile though it would have been. But this was different.

Lips were lips, but Robb Stark’s hand against her face, after, had been more intimate than she could bear. Rhaenys stared at it and tried not to think about his thumb rubbing against the line of her jaw. Fortunately, he distracted her by speaking. “I suppose I should congratulate you.”

“I suppose you should,” Rhaenys agreed. “So why aren’t you?”

Robb raised his eyebrows. “Because you’re not smiling.”

She squeezed her hand into a fist to stop herself from reaching up to her mouth. For a long moment, Robb surveyed her with cool blue eyes.

“If not to congratulate me,” Rhaenys managed through the lump forming in her throat, “why _are_ you here, Robb?”

“I’ll make you a vow, princess,” he told her instead of answering. He reached for her hand. She let him take it. “I will never take anything of you that is not offered. I will ask nothing of you that you’re unwilling to give. And may the gods cast me down where I stand if I ever hurt you.”

He twined their fingers together, and Rhaenys’s heart _didn’t_ leap into her throat. He was barely touching her, but that contact – palm against palm, fingers wrapped with fingers – felt more real than anything else in the world. She swallowed and remembered how it felt for his hand to be pressed to her cheek instead. And he was still looking at her.

“I would have your hand in marriage if you’d honour me with it, and if you won’t, I’d like to escort you safely wherever you want to go.”

Rhaenys could only shake her head. “I will make no man king.”

“As I said. That’s not why I want to marry you.” He smiled, then added, “After all, I _am_ already a king, princess.”

But Rhaenys straightened her back and said, “Queen.”

Robb blinked slowly, then inclined his head.

“Queen,” he echoed. “Yes.”

“Don’t you see,” she said, “that’s why I can’t marry you. I’m not – you cannot have all those things you want. Not with a southron queen. Not with me.”

“And what do you think I want, Your Grace?”

“To go home,” she said. “The North is no place for me.”

“You might be surprised,” Robb said. “But even if you’re right…home isn’t a place. I wouldn’t mind spending more time away from Winterfell if I could spend it with you.”

“A child to inherit your throne,” Rhaenys countered. “I won’t bear one.”

And Robb shrugged. “I have a sister. Should I die without issue, Winterfell belongs to Sansa. My family will endure. Like yours.”

“A wife that can love you and trust you with all her heart,” Rhaenys tried, “and not be afraid when you touch her.”

Robb asked, “Can’t you?”

 _I don’t even know what love is,_ Rhaenys thought, and said, “I don’t know how.”

Robb looked meaningfully at their hands, still tangled together, and pressed two of the fingers of his free hand against her wrist. They remained there for a few breaths before Robb looked back into her eyes, brows raised. He didn’t say anything. He didn’t have to.

His point had been clear enough.

Rhaenys slumped. “I still don’t –”

Robb ran his thumb along the length of hers. Gentle, always gentle.

“You haven’t told me that you don’t want me,” he said. “Tell me that and I’ll never speak of it again.”

Rhaenys opened her mouth, then closed it again. She lowered her gaze to their joined hands.

Her knife still pressed against her skin, so easy to reach. Robb held her nondominant hand with both of his, the fingers of one intertwined with hers and the other still pressed against her wrist. She was freer to move than he was. She didn’t. If she wanted, she could raise her voice and the two of the Dornishmen Arianne had assigned to guard her that lingered by the door would be at her side in an instant. But she didn’t.

She kept staring at the hands holding hers. She thought of one pressed against her cheek and an anger that comforted rather than frightened – anger not at her, but at anyone who would hurt her. Gentle hands and blazing eyes and a presence that burned bright enough to chase away the fears dwelling in darkness and warm her to the core.

Robb Stark was a warrior. Never had she considered that something by which she ought to be comforted.

She dragged in a deep breath and placed her free hand atop his. Though her heart threatened to beat out of her chest as she did it, Robb’s answering smile made it worth it. It was kindness and safety and light, warmth enough that if she let him, he might melt her away.

“Where would you like to go first?” he asked, adjusting their hands so his left hand held her right and his right held her left. The King in the North and the Queen of the Six Kingdoms, sneaking off and holding hands like a squire and a lord’s daughter. Rhaenys had never imagined such a thing could feel so nice. “It would be my honour to escort you.”

Dragonstone where it was safe, out of reach of this place she hated. Sunspear that had been her mother’s home, that Arianne spoke of with such fondness. Casterly Rock so she could dance upon the ruins and laugh as she took from the Lannisters what they’d long taken from her.

There was a whole world out there waiting for her. How could she possible decide?

“It’s been a long time since I left King’s Landing,” she said. Her fingers itched to knit together, but the gentle pressure of Robb’s hands stilled them. “I’m not sure…”

“A progress, perhaps?” he suggested. “We could see everything. I wouldn’t mind getting to do that myself. All I’ve seen has been during war. Where would you want to start?”

 _Dragonstone,_ she thought; _Sunspear,_ she thought; “Oldtown,” she said.

“Oh?”

“I think I’d like to see it,” she said. “I…like books. Arianne told me one of our cousins lives there. I’ve never met her.”

Robb nodded thoughtfully. “Oldtown it is.”

“I wonder…” she began, half to him and half to herself. “I wonder if I could enact something like the Citadel for women. To teach medicine and midwifery.”

“A reformist,” Robb teased, a twinkle in his blazing eyes. “I like that.”

Rhaenys laughed.

There were guards nearby and a crown atop her head and a knife hidden up her sleeve, but right then, all these things that she feared and took comfort in felt nowhere near as important as the king holding her hands, as the warmth of that king’s smile.

“I’m not much of a reader,” he said, but somehow, it didn’t seem dismissive. Not with the way he looked at her as if she were the only person in the world. “My sister is, though. Do you like to ride, my lady?”

“I –”

Surely a Kingsguard hadn’t lifted her on top of a pony when she was barely old enough to toddle while her mother watched from the ramparts and her delighted laughter rang out. That must have been a dream. Still, the imagined joy made her want to smile, even now.

“I don’t know,” she said. “I’ve never…never really ridden. Or gone anywhere.”

“I’ll take you,” he promised. “Anywhere you want to go.”

He brought her hand to his mouth and pressed his lips to her knuckles. This time, she didn’t flinch back from his kiss.

This time, she was the one to cover his mouth with hers.

**Author's Note:**

> I...I don't even know. Forgive me if this is a bit of a mess, it took me so long that when I finished, I was all, fuck editing, if it's bad, it's bad. But this was a labour of love, you don't even know. Rhaenys Targaryen is my baby, and I want her to be happy, but I also seem to enjoy making her suffer. Let me know what you think?


End file.
